Cheeto Dreams

The bag of Cheetos in the pantry sings its siren song.

There is no way to sneak a handful without it leaving guilty orange stains on your fingers, under your nails, and stuck to the inside valleys of your teeth.  You suck the evidence from your fingers, but first, since no one is looking, you pry the sticky mess from between your back molars and the inside of your cheek.

You know they are not good for you, but if powdered milk, powdered eggs, and powdered potatoes are allowed to exist, why not a corn puff covered in powdered cheddar cheese? Why not count it as part of your daily calcium intake?

You’ve tried the puffs, the balls, the X’s and the O’s.  They come in white cheddar, baked, natural, and flaming hot, but since they were first created in San Antonio in 1948, and you are proud of your heritage - you are a purist!

Only Crunchy Cheetos for you!

You follow a sacred ritual.  You inspect them, looking for those rare Cheetos that look like famous people (so you can sell them on eBay and get rich and famous), then you eat all the big ones first and save the small, broken bits for last.  

If you are in danger of being discovered, you skip the ritual and upend the bag, gobbling all the evidence in big mouthfuls before some goody-two-shoes (in a size four dress) comes along and saves you from yourself and your overactive imagination.

You hide the empty bag at the bottom of the trash can.  You scrub your hands and check your teeth; you make promises to yourself not to do that again.  No one will ever know your guilty secret, but wait!

Was that a bag of Oreos hiding behind the steel cut oatmeal?

Quick.  No one is looking. You need something sweet to offset all that sodium but be careful. There is no way to sneak an Oreo without it leaving its calling card on your teeth and announcing what you have done.